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<TD><FONT size=2><A
href="http://www.eurekareporter.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?ArticleID=12778">http://www.eurekareporter.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?ArticleID=12778</A></FONT></TD></TR>
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<TD class=articleTitle><SPAN id=ArticleControl1_lblTitle>Ninth
Circuit court upholds restriction of salmon season</SPAN></TD></TR>
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<TD class=articleByline><SPAN id=ArticleControl1_lblDateAndAuthor>by
Nathan Rushton, 7/7/2006</SPAN></TD></TR>
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<TD class=articleBody><SPAN id=ArticleControl1_lblBody>It was more
bad news Thursday for the fishermen seeking a legal remedy to this
summer’s drastically restricted salmon season, which has threatened
the financial livelihood of West Coast fishermen and kept many boats
docked.<BR><BR>Despite the fishermen’s challenge, the Ninth Circuit
Court of Appeals upheld the federal government’s action to restrict
salmon fishing off a 700-mile stretch of Oregon and California coast
because of low projected returns of salmon that will spawn naturally
in the Klamath River.<BR><BR>After numerous public hearings in the
spring, the Pacific Fisheries Management Council recommended in
April that the salmon season be significantly reduced because fewer
than 25,000 chinook salmon were expected to return to the Klamath
River — 10,000 below the baseline number that triggers stricter
management.<BR><BR>The suit against Department of Commerce Secretary
Carlos Gutierrez and National Marine Fisheries Service directors
objected to the 1989 regulation establishing the 35,000 natural
spawner escapement number for the Klamath River on which the 2005
action was based, according to the court documents.<BR><BR>The
plaintiffs’ primary claim was that the Magnuson-Stevens Act forbids
the NMFS to distinguish between natural and hatchery spawners for
the purposes of making decisions on Klamath chinook management and
conservation.<BR><BR>In its opinion published Thursday, the court
rejected the legal challenge brought by the 15 coastal fishermen and
fishing business owner plaintiffs, which include the Oregon Trollers
Association, the Suislaw Fishermen’s Association, as well as
McKinleyville’s Cap’n Zach’s Crab House, which is now closed in the
wake of a dismally delayed crab season.<BR><BR>The Hoopa Valley and
Yurok tribes, whose reservations rely on salmon caught from the
Klamath River and its tributaries for food, intervened in support of
the NMFS decision.<BR><BR>Russ Brooks, managing attorney for the
Pacific Legal Foundation who represented the fishermen, said in a
news release following the ruling Thursday that the Magnuson-Stevens
Fisheries Act requires federal regulators to manage all members of a
species the same way.<BR><BR>“Hatchery chinook are not only
biologically identical to those that will spawn naturally, but many
hatchery chinook do return to spawn naturally,” Brooks
said.<BR><BR>Indicating that the Marine Fisheries Service was wrong
not to count all hatchery chinook as part of the returning chinook
population, Brooks said the agency is “deliberately lowballing” the
number of salmon that will return to the river.<BR><BR>“If all
hatchery chinook were counted as part of the population, the service
would realize there is no need to drastically reduce salmon
fishing,” Brooks said.<BR><BR>Indicating that the court did not
recognize the legal requirement that regulators must count all
chinook, Brooks stated in the news release that the decision is ripe
for an appeal before the full Ninth Circuit court and possibly the
U.S. Supreme Court.</SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD>
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<TD class=bodytext align=middle colSpan=3>Copyright (C) 2005, The Eureka
Reporter. All rights reserved.
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